


Ethanol

by Lue4028



Series: The Most Dangerous Chemical [6]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Drunken Kissing, Drunkenness, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-12
Updated: 2014-11-19
Packaged: 2018-02-24 11:08:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2579387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lue4028/pseuds/Lue4028





	1. Chapter 1

“So what’s the plan?” John asks as Sherlock scrambles about his bedroom and retrieves a leather notepad and pen.

“Field day.” Sherlock puts the pen in his mouth, sandwiches the booklet between his side and elbow, and shakes suspicious-looking food pellets out of what looks like a prescription bottle into Algernon’s cage. The mouse eyes the food-stuff with distaste.

“So what does that mean?”

“It means we’re going people watching,” Sherlock informs him, “Dorm party starting in 10.” Sherlock caps the translucent orange, child-proof bottle and sets it on the counter.

“And what do we want with people at a dorm party, then?”

 “Observe alcohol in its natural habitat. Hopefully spike the punch. I’ve never had access to such a large sample size of mentally-compromised individuals,” Sherlock grabs his keys, turns off the light, and passes John through the door.

“That’s not happening, Sherlock,” John tells him, eyes following Sherlock as he bounds down the hall.

Sherlock twirls around to face him for a moment, hands in his coat pockets. “Fair enough, we’ll just sit back and watch them dose themselves.”

“We?”

“You are coming aren’t you? I need you, John,” Sherlock tells him, turning left for the staircase.

“As a chaperone?”

“No. As my date,” Sherlock smirks, leaning back over the bend of the corner. John returns his enthusiasm with exasperation. Sherlock spins on his heel and heads down the stairs, out of sight.

“He’s getting carried away with this,” John frowns.


	2. Chapter 2

The party has the entirety of the first floor packed with people and submerged in a din of chatter. Sherlock is leaning against the wall, carefully tracking the coordination, and lapse thereof, of twenty-five proximate individuals. Two male students are engaging in a shots competition. Sherlock makes a note of this on the notepad he has left on the arm of the common room couch, but for the rest of his observations he simply keeps mental notes. John stands-by, checking out girls.

 “Hey, Holmes. Beer?” Alex, an A organic chemistry student with hair dyed blond, approaches and offers Sherlock a cup.

 “He’s underage. Bugger off,” John glares at him.

“Sheesh. Alright, _Dad_ ,” Alex scoffs.

“You disapprove of me drinking?” Sherlock enquires as Alex wanders off.

“Oh, no. I just don’t like that guy. Sorry, did you want a drink? You don’t drink, do you?” John asks, head turning to face his friend.

“No, nor do I intend to.”

“For the purposes of the experiment, right?” John asks absent-mindedly, his attention directed toward a particular girl across the hall who has caught his interest.

“Granted. Intoxication would likely compromise the reliability of the data.”

John is staring at the girl with an intrigue and perkiness that a dog might stare at a salted meat treat with. Sherlock seems not to notice.

“But…” A girl on the staircase stumbles and falls over another girl, and the two of them fall onto a group of people at the base of the stairs, generating a snowball effect that culminates into a mess of giggles and shrieks.  “To be honest, when I see people drinking, I can’t imagine why you would do that to yourself,” he mutters, staring pathetically at the heap of disorientated individuals.

 “Oh. Good. I’m glad. I mean, I think we already have enough trouble with the cigarettes.” The girl stops talking to her friends and proceeds in their direction with an empty red cup. She is a fair brunette in a black dress with, as she gets closer, apparently green eyes.

“And the cocaine? and the SSRI’s? And the analgesics?”

“Yep,” John remarks, as the girl passes him by, not realizing Sherlock has included cocaine in his list, “So we're agreed- no drinking. I’ll be back in a second, alright?” He says, pushing off the wall.

The girl continues past Sherlock in attempt to get to the common room, presumably to get more beer, however Sherlock trips her before this happens. John successfully catches her, however, and the grin of success on Sherlock’s face is short-lived.

“Uh, sorry about that. Are you alright?” John asks helping her up, apparently too infatuated to shoot Sherlock a glare.

“Yeah. Thanks. You are?”

“John. Can I get you a drink?” He asks with a happy-go-lucky smile, taking a step toward the center table with four beer kegs on it. She follows, her hand lingering on his.

Sherlock watches them walk over to alcohol central together, then kicks off the wall and proceeds down the hallway, abandoning his notebook and experiment. He walks briskly toward the staircase on the opposite end of the dorm, but slows down as he catches sight of Alex amongst the hub of people. He stares for a moment, then changes course, sifting through people until he arrives next to Alex.

“Here you go. This is what you’re after, isn’t it?” Alex offers him the cup again, with a half-smile.


	3. Chapter 3

“Here you go. This is what you’re after, isn’t it?” Alex nudges Sherlock with a cup, offering a half-smile.

Sherlock looks unenthusiastically at the mixture of water, carbohydrates, and ethanol.

“ _Try it._ ” He goads him in an exasperated tone.

Sherlock looks at Alex skeptically, eyes narrow.

“Aren’t you curious?” Alex asks temptingly.

That seems to do the trick. Sherlock glances at the red cup, then at Alex in an underhand way. He snatches the cup compulsively and swigs it. Alex beams in success.

“I see your boyfriend’s enjoying himself,” Alex smiles, his eyes transversing the room to where John is. “Aren't you?”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Sherlock replies curtly, not bothered to spare John a glance.

Alex laughs. “I could have told you that.”

Sherlock frowns. “What do you mean?”

“Well he’s obviously straight,” Alex lifts his hand and points at John with his index, keeping his remaining digits curled around the brim of his cup. John is still chatting up his female of interest, and the girl clearly finds him amusing.

Sherlock looks at them for moment, then redirects his glare to the blankness of the wall and imbibes some more of his new best friend.

“Aw, come on, Holmes. We’ve gotta employ some level of self-respect, alright. No falling for straight guys.” Quinn wags a finger at Sherlock didactically.

“What am I?” Sherlock asks in an existential tone.

“What are you what?”

“If John is straight, what am I?”

“Oh, easy. You’re-” Alex starts without thinking but then catches Sherlock's eyes. He shifts his weight back slightly. He looks directly at those steel-grey irises and can’t seem to form any words. The silence spans until Alex breaks it with an amused, somewhat tense laugh. “Shoot. I don’t know. You’re some kind of machine or something.”

Sherlock looks perplexed and slightly annoyed. “What does that have to do with sexual orientation?”

“What does that have to _do_ with it?” Alex laughs and shakes his head. “Do you ever wonder why you don’t see machines making out?”

Sherlock narrows his eyes, trying to follow the question. “Because they aren’t programmed to, whereas people are- I don’t understand, what are you getting at?”

Alex can't help but smile, his face alight with a helpless kind of humor and amusement. “You’re totally wack,” he resigns incredulously.

“Wack. You think I’m a freak.”

“Of course you’re a freak,” Alex jests like it’s common sense.

Sherlock falls silent.

“Er… I didn’t mean-“ Alex scrambles, “it just that’s what everyone says-” Alex explains, failing rather miserably at undoing his previous slur. Sherlock stares at him emotionlessly, a flicker of what is debatably amusement in his eyes.

“That doesn’t bother you though,” Alex realizes.

“No, it doesn’t,” Sherlock says, his voice carefully even.

“You’d have to be human for that to bother you.”

“You caught me,” Sherlock plays along snarkily. His snakelike eyes are venomous, piercing, an off-putting balance of carnal and clinical that sharpens and accentuates his starkly-contrasted features. Alex bites down on his lip.

John realizes Sherlock is no longer seated where he left him. His gaze panes around the boisterous room, densely populated with students, searching for his friend.

“Sorry, excuse me,” John absently tells the girl he was previously talking to. He heads down the length of the hall, sidestepping through people in the dim light, his head turning left and right.

“Damn," Alex muses in awe, "Even if you are a machine, you are a pretty piece of meat.”

“Merely transport.” Sherlock disclaims.

“I have no I idea what that means.”

“Not surprised,” Sherlock responds listlessly, then falters sideways.

“Woah, kid. Why are you such a lightweight?” Alex shifts him back to center with a tug and bolsters him against the wall, keeping an arm snaked around the small of his back. Sherlock starts muttering calculations under his breath.

John catches sight of Alex cornering Sherlock against the wall and his hand tightens into a fist. He tears through the crowd of people, bodies flitting by, a current of fabric coursing against him.

“BMI..” _19.6 Volume 7?_ “What comes after…” _7? 8. “_ Blood alcohol” _0\. 0. 0…? Wait I already calculated this._

“Kiss me.” Alex is leering at him, infatuated and paying no attention to Sherlock’s incomprehensible whispers.

“Whatever for?” Sherlock eyes narrow on Alex’s. They are nose to nose, Alex pinning him against the wall, one hand splayed over the surface and caging him in.

“Because I want you, you dork,” Alex murmurs against his ear. He pulls on the crest of his ear with his teeth.

“Kissing is hardly necessary for what you have in mind,” Sherlock states level-headedly, eyes closed.

“Okay. What do you have in mind?” Alex’s nose skims down Sherlock’s neck, dragging lightly against his skin.

“I was referring to _your_ mind. Mine is …perfectly pristine,” Sherlock struggles to say as Alex presses his mouth against his neck, repeatedly and with increasing aggression. The force of the movement urges Sherlock to tilt his head.

“Really.”

Sherlock’s fringe sways with the momentum of Alex necking him with hungry insistence, his arm tightening around his midsection. Alex grinds against him and Sherlock gasps softly, relaxing indulgently against the oncoming pressure.

“You'd make an excellent fix,” Alex growls, “Convenient. Disposable. God, you’re such a hot-”

John is a few paces away, intercepted by a dense crowd of people.

“Hallow-”

He cuts through best he can, keeping his eyes on them fixedly.

“Empty-”

He jostles through the last few people

“Soulless-”

and emerges from the background of bodies.

“Sex doll.”

Sherlock is slightly out of breath, his mind swimming. John has stepped out of the mass and grabs Alex by the upper arm. John pulls him away from Sherlock and Sherlock’s eyes blink open, pleasantly surprised to see John. John hits Alex across the face with an impact that whiplashes and sends him to the floor. The action elicits quite a few wide-eyed stares.

When John looks up, Sherlock is smiling at him, eyes with alight with a vibrant display of emotion-exhilaration, amusement, tenderness, admiration.

“You did well, John. You did well,” he grins irrepressibly. John recognizes the complex dance on Sherlock’s face as pride, which he finds immediately irksome.

“And what the hell were you doing?” John asks, annoyed, “You couldn’t have done something?”

“What good would that have done?” Sherlock frowns.

“Sherlock, this is not about trying to make an impression. You can’t just let people take advantage- Is this a big game to you? You didn’t plan this, did you?”

“No…”

“You couldn’t have. You’re drunk. You’re completely drunk. What happened? I thought you said you didn't like drinking. I thought we agreed you wouldn't.”

“I got bored.”

“So what, you thought this would be fun?” John demands with a dramatic whirl of hand gestures, then walks around the banister toward the staircase.

“You sound angry, John,” Sherlock follows.

“Actually, I am,” John pauses in front of the staircase to inform him, then resumes his course, trekking up, “I’m sick of your stupidly dangerous experiments. Alcohol does worse than just kill people and I honestly don’t see why you couldn’t just leave it alone.”

“Is this about your sister?” Sherlock asks as he moves up a step.

 _“Do not talk about my sister,”_ John turns around on the staircase and snaps.


	4. Chapter 4

“John..”

“Don’t do that, Sherlock,” John tells him firmly, carrying up the stairs.

“Don’t do what?” Sherlock inquires in earnest.

“Don’t whine like that!” John snaps impatiently, “Do you want me to give you something to whine about?”

“John,” Sherlock starts again. John tiredly ignores him.

“I’m sorry.”

“Shut up,” John mutters vitriolicly.

“Really I. I do meant it John.”

“It wasn’t that I was bored,” he adds shamefacedly.

“It was, in effect, because of you,” he confesses.

John’s eyebrows furrow and he turns around.

“Because of me?”

“I was being… emotional.”

John looks at him in surprise, going silent for five or six heartbeats.

“Okay. Then next time, just tell me what I’m doing that’s bothering you- you even don’t have to explain- just say the word and I’ll stop,” John says submissively.

Sherlock looks hesitant, as though he might just prefer to die of alcohol poisoning. “That’s easier said than done.”

“Sherlock— I wish you wouldn’t—“ John starts in a rush, but the words catch in his mouth. He tries again. “I wish you wouldn’t turn to alcohol to drown out your problems, especially if it’s my fault. That in itself makes me nervous because I know what you’re like with smoking and—“

“Does my smoking really bother you?”

“No. Yes. I mean. It’s just if you were anything like that with drinking—“

“Ah...” Sherlock hadn’t thought about that.

“I’m sorry I over-reacted. You’re right about Harry. I don’t want to lose you like I lost her,” John winces painfully.

“Am I forgiven?”

“Forgiven? It’s as you said. This was my fault. If I had been with you this wouldn’t have happened. Instead,” he looks away pensively, “I don’t know what I was doing. I’m sorry.”

Sherlock gives him a gentle smile that curves shyly at the edges and John’s heart skips a beat.


	5. Chapter 5

Sherlock looks faint and completely spent, his collar ragged and shirt in disarray. John eyes him with concern, his eyebrows crossing into a scowl.

“That bastard.”

John reaches a hand to his forehead, his eyes glancing searchingly over his friend’s face. Sherlock closes his eyes upon contact and his lips part with a sigh, surrendering as the complaints of his transport overwhelm him, dark lashes sweeping down against incredibly pale skin.

“Hang on.”

Tugging him by the elbow, John guides Sherlock to the bathroom across the carpeted hall. Their feet patter over the tiles as he arranges Sherlock and himself into a stall, the door falling shut at his back.

Sherlock immediately doubles over, all claims to composure abandoned, the starch of his collar shirt sliding against the leather of John’s jacket. John keeps his grip firm on his arm to lend support, and places his opposite hand steady on his shoulder, arcing over his bowed back and cradling some of his weight. Sherlock coughs, his body shivering with revulsion. John collects his bangs away from his face, sliding his digits through the material of his hair and keeping it in a fist against Sherlock’s hairline. He turns his neck to see around the back of Sherlock’s head and realizes little to nothing is being remitted.

“Sherlock, when was the last time you ate?”

“October,” Sherlock manages painfully.

John pulls him back up, snagging fistfuls of his shirt. “ _October?!_ ”

“You fed me a Kit-Kat.”

John remembers the blatant look of euphoria on Sherlock’s face when the small bar of processed chocolate John had forced on his lips touched his tongue.

“Now I have a particular fondness for Halloween.”

John shakes his head. “You’re white as a sheet,” he says, part in disapproval, part in awe. His fingertips trail against the surface of Sherlock’s cheekbone. His eyes glance at his lips, his own parting imperceptibly, two normally unassociated wires crossing momentarily in his intoxicated brain. The phantom of a thought looms like a fog in his mind, before it elicits an overwhelming sensation of nausea that has him expelling the contents of his stomach into the toilet.

“I’m sorry. Did I make you sick?”

“No-“ John replies, recollecting himself standing upright. “It’s- I was thinking weird thoughts.”

“They weren’t weird,” he states factually, “Only a bit.. dirty.”

John looks at him with incredulous blue eyes, gaping. Sherlock returns his appall with a smirk.

“You’ve got-“ Sherlock starts, hand cursorily pointing at John, then glancing his own mouth. He then runs his thumb against John’s bottom lip before John can stop him, ridding him of a smear of vomit.

“That’s disgusting.” John is aghast, hand coming to his mouth.

“Is it?” Sherlock smiles, his eyes lighting up mischievously, then extends his vomit-smeared hand an inch from John’s face. John is repulsed and grabs Sherlock’s wrist in attempt to restrain his onslaught.

“It’s only previously digested food. It’s harmless. Even edible,” he informs John, countering all of John’s moves playfully.

“I am not eating that. _You_ eat it,” John retorts, warding off Sherlock’s wayward hand. He turns his cheek to the outstretched hand sullied with unsightly fluid.

Sherlock stops playing and their hands still in mid motion. Sherlock gives John a dark, intense look that’s all deviousness and John returns it with a sort of lost helplessness. Sherlock leans forward and barely touches John's mouth, vertical lips on horizontal, tilting his head to expose a scalene triangle of jaw. John’s eyes dip closed on contact and he breathes a tense exhale against Sherlock’s mouth, feeling every hair on the back of his neck stand like an extremely vexed feline.

Sherlock waits moment, John still as a statue and spine straight as a rod, their lips buzzing against each other. Sherlock moves forward, forcing John’s scalp against the stall wall. His mouth presses dryly against John’s with warm, over-powerful force that tests the strength of his mandible and teeth. John gives an inch and suddenly Sherlock has his mouth wide open, jaws driving sideways against his, into his mouth, deep down to the corners of his lips and prying his molars apart. John's mouth flexes and relaxes, cheeks hallow, Sherlock scouring their insides. John feels his throat choke with tightness and gags, whimpering slightly into Sherlock's mouth. He's repressing gagging again when Sherlock places a soothing hand on his neck beneath his ear, keeping the nausea in his stomach at bay.

John lets out a disgruntled hum into the kiss and removes his mouth. Instinctively, he rubs his bottom lip with the side of his thumb, then darts his tongue over the inner edge of his upper lip and grazes his teeth over his bottom lip again. He keeps his eyes closed and focuses on not vomiting again.

 


	6. Chapter 6

"John?"

John opens his eyes to see Sherlock looking at him with a puzzled expression. "Are we having weird thoughts?"

"Ah… no,” John side-steps toward the door, their shoulders in parallel.

“What were you thinking about?” Sherlock’s looks at him as he moves past.

“Nothing,” John says, pressing his hand to the door and spinning it on its hinge. He scuttles out of the stall and Sherlock follows, walking out into the second floor hall.

 “You won’t look at me. Why won’t you look at me?” Sherlock demands, offended.

“No reason.” John says, continuing down the carpeted corridor.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“No you didn’t-“ John turns around vexedly, temper cut short by the nuisance of his incessant nagging and the suggestion that he is somehow at fault. 

“What was it?” Sherlock asks with a set of crystal blue eyes that leave John speechless. They are standing in front of the threshold of Sherlock’s room.

“I..”

“You’re embarrassed,” Sherlock calculates.

“I’m not,” John maintains, feeling like he’s playing tug-of-war.

“John..” Sherlock says softly, his voice twisting John’s arm with the tenderness and sincerity of its disapprobation.

“I. was thinking about—  I thought— For a second, I thought you kissed me,” John is coaxed into saying. He quickly turns into the bedroom, head downcast.

Sherlock tilts his head like John has said something very amusingly peculiar, because he has, and follows after him. “That would be highly irregular. I’ve never kissed anyone in my life.”

The comment elicits a surprised look.

“Don’t you think that would be a bit odd, John?” he queries. John returns to his seat on the bed.

“More than a bit.” Sherlock is standing by the side of the bed, hands on his waist. He appears to be assessing the length of the bed.

“What?”

He lies down supine, placing his head on John’s lap.

“Oh,” John realizes. Sherlock H is officially out of commission.


End file.
